This article first appeared in Capital, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on April 2, 2018 - April 8, 2018

Forget about a raise for all civil servants as part of an election strategy. Just give all the money to the folks at Dewan Bahasa & Pustaka — they deserve it! And give them some cake while you are at it.

When I tell my friends to “jom swafoto”, for some reason, all of them hold their sides laughing.

Now, who was it who said if at first you fail, try and try again?

“Ade tak kayu swafoto?” I ask with a smile. More laughter.  The words bodoh and gila are mentioned several times.

But isn’t kayu the word for stick? Maybe it should be swafoto kayu, or selfie stick.

I try a third time: “Maybe our swafoto may go tular and it may be the imej tumpu of the day for some?”

That elicites guffaws and actual tears ... and it’s clearly a failed enterprise.

For those of you who don’t have a clue what’s going on, we have new words to use. Swafoto is the new word for selfie, tular for viral, and imej tumpu for highlight.

Then there’s swafoto maut to mean killfie, that is, a dangerous selfie.

Dewan Bahasa & Pustaka must have felt a need for some new words, which include kata pikat, for pick-up line.

Imej tumpu? Maybe we should come up with a word for imej, instead of just spelling image differently.

Anyway, here are some other new words coined by Dewan Bahasa & Pustaka, some of which sound really serious. For instance, there’s pascanilai to mean post mortem, and tunafoto for photobomb — awkward to say the least.

Just imagine the sang saka biru or men in blue going, “Pascanilai sudah selesai tuan!” Unlikely ya?

Maybe they should have gone for pos mortem instead of pascanilai.

Meanwhile, role model is suri teladan — teladan means example and suri means well. Who would have guessed.

Meridap is the new word for nap, so we can write, for example, that what politicians do in the August house is meridap. Is there a word for cat nap?

Maybe Dewan Bahasa & Pustaka should go on a jerayawara (road show) to promote these new words. And don’t forget the word for back drop is latar pentas while buntings are known as gegantung.

Isn’t that what we just need — words for selfie, pick-up line, back drop, buntings and road show?

How about coming up with important words, such as billion? It’s sad that we have a word for million, juta, but not for billion, so we have to use the English word for it.

Also, instead of just changing the spelling for words such as komited, let’s come up with something entirely new.

But you know something, none of these words feel right, like some of the older words.

Take geram, for instance — it is ideal to describe the feeling of being exasperated. Just say it — gerrrrammmm ... it feels so right.

So is gigi for teeth, and muntah for throwing up — they sound appropriate. Well, better than tular anyway.

Let’s hope these new words have better luck than Bahasa Baku ... remember that?

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